


the rock cried out, i can't hide you

by voodoochild



Category: Boardwalk Empire
Genre: Alternate Universe - Apocalypse, Demons, Gen, Parent/Child Incest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-24
Updated: 2012-11-24
Packaged: 2017-11-19 08:58:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 512
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/571506
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/voodoochild/pseuds/voodoochild
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jimmy, Gillian, some survivors, and a demon apocalypse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the rock cried out, i can't hide you

**Author's Note:**

> Ceebee requested Jimmy/Gillian and an apocalypse, and Nina Simone's "Sinnerman" provided the title. This could, but doesn't necessarily, take place in the same universe as [what's done in the dark must be brought to the light](http://archiveofourown.org/works/361876).

He misses the sniper, and truth be told, so does she. 

Jimmy's a good shot - her boy shoots straight and true and unflinching - but she's not, and these things just keep on coming. Another gun hand would be more than welcome, no matter personal feelings.

Not much works on the Things. She's heard whispers from other survivors - "demons", "beasts", "monsters" - but Jimmy tells her he's seen soldiers in trenches more frightening than these beings, so they just call them "Things". They fear nothing, because not much has been able to kill them. They laugh off fire, drowning, gunshots and the few stupid people who try their fists. Jimmy's combat knife has worked enough to make them bleed, and they'd managed to trap one in a graveyard.

She hasn't stopped bleeding since the night the Things came, and neither has Jimmy. The ache goes down to her bones, leeching her of strength to keep running. But run they do, hiding out in old warehouses, a hut under the boardwalk, the basement of a Negro church.

There are rumors (that few believe, but Jimmy's one of them) that New York is free of the Things. Jimmy says it's Rothstein, that not even the Devil himself would want to bet against the Bankroll. Gillian doesn't quite care, if it means safety. So they set north, with a group from the church: Albert White and his family, the Irish girl from the dress shop, a man with a curious laugh, Damian who was once an alderman, Babette, two Negro men and three women, and two of the girls from the Beaux Arts who'd come crying to the door and she found she couldn't turn away.

No one's heard from Nucky or the Commodore in weeks. No one's seen them in longer. 

(She doesn't mind. They got what was coming to them.)

They sleep rough most nights, she and Jimmy curled up in each other for warmth, and only Kitty and Daisy ever knew she and Jimmy were mother and son. They'll keep it to themselves, and Gillian finds she likes it better when men treat her as Jimmy's wife (because mothers are overlooked and their presence makes sons weak, but wives or sweethearts are the subject of soldiers' dreams and everyone else's respect). Everyone looks to Jimmy and Albert for leadership, and to Mrs. White and Gillian for comfort. Lenore White is made of steel and good breeding, for a colored girl, and Gillian finds she likes her.

Their group is not without hardship - Damian falls to the Things, as does one of the Negroes and Kitty - and one of the Negro ladies contracts a persistent cough. She's shot by one of the menfolk, Gillian doesn't know which, though Jimmy regrets not having done it himself. Food is not plentiful, but better than they'd expected. Stealing from farms helps, especially when the Irish girl proves herself a decent cook and a better thief.

Coming up on forty-two days on the road, filthy and bloody and living in darkness, the lights of Manhattan have never looked brighter.


End file.
